Les Misérables by Victor Hugo (early reader books txt) 📕

“His name is Jean Valjean.”

“I know it.”

“I am going to tell you, equally for nothing, who he is.”

“Say on.”

“He is an ex-convict.”

“I know it.”

“You know it since I have had the honor of telling you.”

“No. I knew it before.”

Marius’ cold tone, that double reply of “I know it,” his laconicism, which was not favorable to dialogue, stirred up some smouldering wrath in the stranger. He launched a furious glance on the sly at Marius, which was instantly extinguished. Rapid as it was, this glance was of the kind which a man recognizes when he has once beheld it; it did not escape Marius. Certain flashes can only proceed from certain souls; the eye, that vent-hole of the thought, glows with it; spectacles hide nothing; try putting a pane of glass over hell!

The stranger resumed with a smile:

“I will not permit myself to contradict Monsieur le Baron. In any case, you ought to perceive that I am well informed. Now what I have to tell you is known to myself alone. This concerns the fortune of Madame la Baronne. It is an extraordinary secret. It is for sale—I make you the first offer of it. Cheap. Twenty thousand francs.”

“I know that secret as well as the others,” said Marius.

The personage felt the necessity of lowering his price a trifle.

“Monsieur le Baron, say ten thousand francs and I will speak.”

“I repeat to you that there is nothing which you can tell me. I know what you wish to say to me.”

A fresh flash gleamed in the man’s eye. He exclaimed:

“But I must dine to-day, nevertheless. It is an extraordinary secret, I tell you. Monsieur le Baron, I will speak. I speak. Give me twenty francs.”

Marius gazed intently at him:

“I know your extraordinary secret, just as I knew Jean Valjean’s name, just as I know your name.”

“My name?”

“Yes.”

“That is not difficult, Monsieur le Baron. I had the honor to write to you and to tell it to you. Thénard.”

“—Dier.”

“Hey?”

“Thénardier.”

“Who’s that?”

In danger the porcupine bristles up, the beetle feigns death, the old guard forms in a square; this man burst into laughter.

Then he flicked a grain of dust from the sleeve of his coat with a fillip.

Marius continued:

“You are also Jondrette the workman, Fabantou the comedian, Genflot the poet, Don Alvarès the Spaniard, and Mistress Balizard.”

“Mistress what?”

“And you kept a pot-house at Montfermeil.”

“A pot-house! Never.”

“And I tell you that your name is Thénardier.”

“I deny it.”

“And that you are a rascal. Here.”

And Marius drew a bank-note from his pocket and flung it in his face.

“Thanks! Pardon me! five hundred francs! Monsieur le Baron!”

And the man, overcome, bowed, seized the note and examined it.

“Five hundred francs!” he began again, taken aback. And he stammered in a low voice: “An honest rustler.”69

Then brusquely:

“Well, so be it!” he exclaimed. “Let us put ourselves at our ease.”

And with the agility of a monkey, flinging back his hair, tearing off his spectacles, and withdrawing from his nose by sleight of hand the two quills of which mention was recently made, and which the reader has also met with on another page of this book, he took off his face as the man takes off his hat.

His eye lighted up; his uneven brow, with hollows in some places and bumps in others, hideously wrinkled at the top, was laid bare, his nose had become as sharp as a beak; the fierce and sagacious profile of the man of prey reappeared.

“Monsieur le Baron is infallible,” he said in a clear voice whence all nasal twang had disappeared, “I am Thénardier.”

And he straightened up his crooked back.

Thénardier, for it was really he, was strangely surprised; he would have been troubled, had he been capable of such a thing. He had come to bring astonishment, and it was he who had received it. This humiliation had been worth five hundred francs to him, and, taking it all in all, he accepted it; but he was nonetheless bewildered.

He beheld this Baron Pontmercy for the first time, and, in spite of his disguise, this Baron Pontmercy recognized him, and recognized him thoroughly. And not only was this Baron perfectly informed as to Thénardier, but he seemed well posted as to Jean Valjean. Who was this almost beardless young man, who was so glacial and so generous, who knew people’s names, who knew all their names, and who opened his purse to them, who bullied rascals like a judge, and who paid them like a dupe?

Thénardier, the reader will remember, although he had been Marius’ neighbor, had never seen him, which is not unusual in Paris; he had formerly, in a vague way, heard his daughters talk of a very poor young man named Marius who lived in the house. He had written to him, without knowing him, the letter with which the reader is acquainted.

No connection between that Marius and M. le Baron Pontmercy was possible in his mind.

As for the name Pontmercy, it will be recalled that, on the battlefield of Waterloo, he had only heard the last two syllables, for which he always entertained the legitimate scorn which one owes to what is merely an expression of thanks.

However, through his daughter Azelma, who had started on the scent of the married pair on the 16th of February, and through his own personal researches, he had succeeded in learning many things, and, from the depths of his own gloom, he had contrived to grasp more than one mysterious clew. He had discovered, by dint of industry, or, at least, by dint of induction, he had guessed who the man was whom he had encountered on a certain day in the Grand Sewer. From the man he had easily reached the name. He knew that Madame la Baronne Pontmercy was Cosette. But he meant to be discreet in that quarter.

Who was Cosette? He did not know exactly himself. He did, indeed, catch an inkling of illegitimacy, the history of Fantine had always seemed to him equivocal; but what was the use of talking about that? in order to cause himself to be paid for his silence? He had, or thought he had, better wares than that for sale. And, according to all appearances, if he were to come and make to the Baron Pontmercy this revelation—and without proof: “Your wife is a bastard,” the only result would be to attract the boot of the husband towards the loins of the revealer.

From Thénardier’s point of view, the conversation with Marius had not yet begun. He ought to have drawn back, to have modified his strategy, to have abandoned his position, to have changed his front; but nothing essential had been compromised as yet, and he had five hundred francs in his pocket. Moreover, he had something decisive to say, and, even against this very well-informed and well-armed Baron Pontmercy, he felt himself strong. For men of Thénardier’s nature, every dialogue is a combat. In the one in which he was about to engage, what was his situation? He did not know to whom he was speaking, but he did know of what he was speaking, he made this rapid review of his inner forces, and after having said: “I am Thénardier,” he waited.

Marius had become thoughtful. So he had hold of Thénardier at last. That man whom he had so greatly desired to find was before him. He could honor Colonel Pontmercy’s recommendation.

He felt humiliated that that hero should have owned anything to this villain, and that the letter of change drawn from the depths of the tomb by his father upon him, Marius, had been protested up to that day. It also seemed to him, in the complex state of his mind towards Thénardier, that there was occasion to avenge the Colonel for the misfortune of having been saved by such a rascal. In any case, he was content. He was about to deliver the Colonel’s shade from this unworthy creditor at last, and it seemed to him that he was on the point of rescuing his father’s memory from the debtors’ prison. By the side of this duty there was another—to elucidate, if possible, the source of Cosette’s fortune. The opportunity appeared to present itself. Perhaps Thénardier knew something. It might prove useful to see the bottom of this man.

He commenced with this.

Thénardier had caused the “honest rustler” to disappear in his fob, and was gazing at Marius with a gentleness that was almost tender.

Marius broke the silence.

“Thénardier, I have told you your name. Now, would you like to have me tell you your secret—the one that you came here to reveal to me? I have information of my own, also. You shall see that I know more about it than you do. Jean Valjean, as you have said, is an assassin and a thief. A thief, because he robbed a wealthy manufacturer, whose ruin he brought about. An assassin, because he assassinated police-agent Javert.”

“I don’t understand, sir,” ejaculated Thénardier.

“I will make myself intelligible. In a certain arrondissement of the Pas de Calais, there was, in 1822, a man who had fallen out with justice, and who, under the name of M. Madeleine, had regained his status and rehabilitated himself. This man had become a just man in the full force of the term. In a trade, the manufacture of black glass goods, he made the fortune of an entire city. As far as his personal fortune was concerned he made that also, but as a secondary matter, and in some sort, by accident. He was the foster-father of the poor. He founded hospitals, opened schools, visited the sick, dowered young girls, supported widows, and adopted orphans; he was like the guardian angel of the country. He refused the cross, he was appointed Mayor. A liberated convict knew the secret of a penalty incurred by this man in former days; he denounced him, and had him arrested, and profited by the arrest to come to Paris and cause the banker Laffitte,—I have the fact from the cashier himself,—by means of a false signature, to hand over to him the sum of over half a million which belonged to M. Madeleine. This convict who robbed M. Madeleine was Jean Valjean. As for the other fact, you have nothing to tell me about it either. Jean Valjean killed the agent Javert; he shot him with a pistol. I, the person who is speaking to you, was present.”

Thénardier cast upon Marius the sovereign glance of a conquered man who lays his hand once more upon the victory, and who has just regained, in one instant, all the ground which he has lost. But the smile returned instantly. The inferior’s triumph in the presence of his superior must be wheedling.

Thénardier contented himself with saying to Marius:

“Monsieur le Baron, we are on the wrong track.”

And he emphasized this phrase by making his bunch of seals execute an expressive whirl.

“What!” broke forth Marius, “do you dispute that? These are facts.”

“They are chimæras. The confidence with which Monsieur le Baron honors me renders it my duty to tell him so. Truth and justice before all things. I do not like to see folks accused unjustly. Monsieur le Baron, Jean Valjean did not rob M. Madeleine and Jean Valjean did not kill Javert.”

“This is too much! How is this?”

“For two reasons.”

“What are they? Speak.”

“This is the first: he did not rob M. Madeleine, because it is Jean Valjean himself who was M. Madeleine.”

“What tale are you telling me?”

“And this is the second: he did not assassinate Javert, because the person who killed Javert was Javert.”

“What do you mean to say?”

“That Javert committed suicide.”

“Prove it! prove it!” cried Marius beside himself.

Thénardier resumed, scanning his phrase after the manner of the ancient Alexandrine measure:

“Police-agent-Ja-vert-was-found-drowned-un-der-a-boat-of-the-Pont-au-Change.”

“But prove it!”

Thénardier drew from his pocket a large envelope of gray paper, which seemed to contain sheets folded in different sizes.

“I have my papers,” he said calmly.

And he added:

“Monsieur le Baron, in your interests I desired to know Jean Valjean thoroughly. I say that Jean Valjean and M. Madeleine are one and the same man, and I say that Javert had no other assassin than Javert. If I speak, it is because I have proofs. Not manuscript proofs—writing is suspicious, handwriting is complaisant,—but printed proofs.”

As he spoke, Thénardier extracted from the envelope two copies of newspapers, yellow, faded, and strongly saturated with tobacco. One of these two newspapers, broken at every fold and falling into rags, seemed much older than the other.

“Two facts, two proofs,” remarked Thénardier. And he offered the two newspapers, unfolded, to Marius.

The reader is acquainted with these two papers. One, the most ancient, a number of the Drapeau Blanc of the 25th of July, 1823, the text of which can be seen in the first volume, established the identity of M. Madeleine and Jean